Civilization: The Board Game

A great, wide world awaits your burgeoning empire. There are remarkable wonders to create, vast cities to build, and sprawling lands to discover. Can you lead your civilization to greatness?

Build the future of your dreams with Sid Meier’s Civilization: The Board Game! Based on the widely popular video game by Sid Meier, Civilization: The Board Game is a board game of empire building in which two to four players compete to establish the most successful civilization of all time. Take control of powerful leaders from throughout history and lead great military campaigns, become the cultural hub of the world, or advance your technology into the stars. The world is at your fingertips.

In Civilization: The Board Game, players can win in a variety of ways, utilizing many different strategies. Perhaps you would like to focus on advancing your civilization on the Culture Track, gracing the world with beautiful works of art, extravagant theaters, and musical masterpieces. Or maybe you have powerful armies under your command, giving you the advantage on the battlefield, and your key to victory is the subjugation of your opponents. Another way to win is by becoming the wealthiest empire, amassing the most gold over the course of the game. And finally, the player that advances their technology far enough to become the first civilization to pursue space travel achieves a technology victory.

One of the most alluring elements of the Civilization video games is the ability to control an empire from the dawn of civilization all the way through to the modern era, expanding your meager nation one step at a time. This element remains a prominent feature in Civilization: The Board Game. Players all begin the game with a single city, a single army, and one scout. You must build your entire civilization from the ground up, gathering resources, conquering villages, expanding your army, and building structures that will further your advancement throughout the ages.

Players are sure to recognize some familiar faces when they choose their civilization leaders. Civilization: The Board Game features six different civilizations, each with its own leaders and special abilities. Will you play as Cleopatra and take advantage of the Egyptians’ ability of quick construction? Or would you rather take on the role of Abraham Lincoln and guide the Americans to victory with their increased production abilities? There are many different strategies within each civilization, and with the various ways to win the game, you will find yourself wanting to play again and again to try out new tactics with new civilizations.

Build an Empire to Stand the Test of Time

A game of Civilization: The Board Game begins by each player selecting a civilization to play as. Players then build the game map by selecting their civilization’s starting tile and shuffling the remaining random tiles to lay face down, creating the unexplored areas of the map.

Each turn of the game consists of start of turn actions, trading, managing your cities, movement/exploration, and research. Players alternate taking actions during each phase of the game until the turn has been completed, then gameplay continues to the next turn.

Start of turn actions include building new cities, changing governments, and any other special start of turn actions provided by Wonders or Culture cards. During the trade phase, players collect trade from their cities and begin negotiating with other players. Unused Culture tokens, Resource tokens, Unit cards, and even promises can all be traded during this phase. Be careful though, because promises are in no way binding!

City Management lets players produce units or scout/army figures, devote their city to the arts, construct buildings or wonders, or harvest a resource. The Movement phase consists of players moving their figures around the board, exploration, and combat. Movement is hindered by terrain unless players have a technology that provides them increased mobility (such as sea travel). When a figure is adjacent to a face down game board tile, the controlling player can spend one movement to explore that tile, turning it face up. Whenever opposing figures end in the same space, battle ensues.

In Civilization: The Board Game, combat is resolved through unit cards and a fast resolution system that takes into account the "era" of your military technological development. Each player draws cards from their available units and chooses which units will fight in the battle. Once the winner is decided, the loser must discard their army figure and the winner may choose their reward from the loser (either three points of trade, three culture tokens, or any one resource token).

Reach for the Stars

One way to victory in Civilization: The Board Game is by researching space travel and launching your people into the stars. To advance your civilization in the technological world, you must move forward one step at a time. The “tech pyramid” system requires that a new technology card be placed above two lower level tech cards. So, in order to research a Level 2 technology, that player needs to have two Level 1 technology cards already researched. Plan your advancements ahead or you may find your civilization falling behind in the world of technology.

Battles Fought in the Blink of an Eye

In Civilization: The Board Game, war is another way to become the greatest civilization in the world. The first player to successfully invade an opposing player’s capital city wins the game, and thanks to an intuitive card-driven combat system, battles are a breeze to wage in Civilization: The Board Game. When two armies clash on the game board, the controlling players take their available Unit cards and randomly draw their hand size of cards. After choosing units, players follow a rock-paper-scissors trump system to determine the winner. This intuitive combat system promotes quick battles with no need to constantly reference stats or roll dice.

The Finer Things in Life

The Culture Track is the central hub for fine arts, theater, music, and literature in Civilization: The Board Game. If one player can devote enough of their energy to it, they can secure a cultural victory by reaching the end of the track. The Culture Track provides many benefits to those who climb its ranks, such as Culture cards and Great People. Culture cards can be played to affect the greater course of the game, while Great People provide civilizations with lingering benefits, such as resources, production, or trade. While some people find strength on the battlefield or in developing world-changing technologies, others become great by bringing culture to an otherwise uncivilized world.

A New World Awaits

Civilization: The Board Game features a modular board that changes with every game. Each player begins the game on a single game board tile placed adjacent to the other face down game board tiles. Only by exploring with their scouts or armies can players reveal these facedown game board tiles. Without exploring the map, players are unable to gather additional resources and build additional cities, so exploration is an important aspect to the game.

There are infinite ways to forge an empire. How will you shape yours? Find out with Sid Meier’s Civilization: The Board Game.